237 reasons we have sex lust

After exhaustively compiling a list of the 237 reasons why people have sex, researchers found that young men and women get intimate for mostly the same motivations. It's more about lust in the body than a love connection in the heart.
College-aged men and women agree on their top reasons for having sex -- they were attracted to the person, they wanted to experience physical pleasure and "it feels good," according to a peer-reviewed study in the August edition of Archives of Sexual Behavior. Twenty of the top 25 reasons given for having sex were the same for men and women.

Expressing love and showing affection were in the top 10 for both men and women, but they did take a back seat to the clear No. 1: "I was attracted to the person."

Researchers at the University of Texas spent five years and their own money to study the overlooked why behind sex while others were spending their time on the how.

"It's refuted a lot of gender stereotypes ... that men only want sex for the physical pleasure and women want love," said University of Texas clinical psychology professor Cindy Meston, the study's co-author. "That's not what I came up with in my findings."

Forget thinking that men are from Mars and women from Venus, "the more we look, the more we find similarity," said Dr. Irwin Goldstein, director of sexual medicine at Alvarado Hospital in San Diego. Goldstein, who wasn't part of Meston's study, said the Texas research made a lot of sense and adds to growing evidence that the vaunted differences in the genders may only be among people with sexual problems.

Meston and colleague David Buss first questioned 444 men and women -- ranging in age from 17 to 52 -- to come up with a list of 237 distinct reasons people have sex. They ranged from "It's fun" which men ranked fourth and women ranked eighth to "I wanted to give someone else a sexually transmitted disease" which ranked on the bottom by women.

Once they came up with that long list, Meston and Buss asked 1,549 college students taking psychology classes to rank the reasons on a one-to-five scale on how they applied to their experiences.

"None of the gender differences are all that great," Meston said. "Men were more likely to be opportunistic towards having sex, so if sex were there and available they would jump on it, somewhat more so than women. Women were more likely to have sex because they felt they needed to please their partner."

But this is among college students, when Meston conceded "hormones run rampant." She predicted huge differences when older groups of people are studied.

Since her study came out Tuesday, people are coming up with new reasons to have sex.

"Originally, I thought that we exhaustively compiled the list, but now I found that there should be some added," Meston said.

Source :http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=227048

A research from Oxford University :Electrons’ ‘love-hate’ clue to superconductivity

A form of ‘shimmering’ superconductivity may offer vital clues as to how superconductors work, according to Oxford University scientists.

The ‘shimmering’ occurs when electrons are caught in two minds about whether they ‘love’ each other (pairing up to create superconductivity) or ‘hate’ each other (are repelled, creating insulating behaviour). In this week’s Nature the Oxford team report that, in a molecular superconductor on the borderline between superconducting and insulating behaviour, a slight preference for love over hate can result in a fluctuating state of superconductivity that exists at temperatures 50% higher than that at which ordinary superconductivity is destroyed.

Superconductors are materials that, once cooled to their critical temperature, exhibit zero electrical resistance and resist the penetration of magnetic fields: They are already finding applications in MRI scanners and electrical power technology.

While shimmering superconductivity only occurs at extremely low temperatures (18K-12K) scientists think that understanding it could lead to future breakthroughs in room-temperature superconductors. The Oxford experiment provides hard evidence that the effect exists in bulk superconductors and is not the result of impurities in the materials being studied.

The discovery was made by Dr Moon-Sun Nam working with Dr Arzhang Ardavan and Professor Stephen Blundell of Oxford University’s Department of Physics, using samples prepared by Dr John Schlueter at Argonne National Laboratory. The team used a probe that can detect when superconducting vortices are present even when a material does not exhibit zero electrical resistance – the conventional measure of ordinary superconductivity.

‘This observation sheds new light on the mechanisms of exotic superconductivity, which have remained elusive despite a number of experimental breakthroughs,’ said Dr Ardavan. ‘We believe that the fluctuating effect should be found in many superconductors in which the ‘love-hate’ relationship between electrons is finely balanced. It represents an important step forward in the quest to understand exotic superconductors.’

Lust for Loving feel

Lust for Loving feel:

Like friendship, love can die. And sometimes the cause is just boredom and benign neglect.

IF DIVORCES are on the rise, what does it say about society and that crazy little thing called love? That “I love you” doesn’t mean that much anymore?

That values like faithfulness, commitment, loyalty and patience are in short supply?

That the belief that the family is the building block of society – and marriage the foundation of the family – is being chipped away?

That love is no guarantee a marriage will last? That marriage is no guarantee love will last? And that even if love doesn’t last, marriage is no longer the glue that holds couples and families together?

That love between a couple can actually die?

A recent study of the United States, Russia and the Scandinavian countries suggested that the traditional “seven-year itch” has been replaced by the five-year itch.

In the 1950s, the rule of thumb was that amber lights would flash when a marriage hit the seven-year mark. Today, couples are at their greatest risk of divorcing just before their fifth wedding anniversary.

The thing about folks like me who’ve never been married and who are maybe harbouring a secret longing to be (if we find the right person, of course) is that we’re incurable romantics.

We believe in the power of love. We actually think people mean it when they utter that till-death-do-us-part bit in their vows.

We place the institution on a pedestal and cling to fairytale ideals and images even when all around us we see daily evidence of how married life can, in fact, be pretty dreary and dreadful, the grind of housework, finances to be managed, children’s homework to be supervised and just general petty marital annoyances.

Yet, when I hear that couples I know are divorcing, I always feel sad and even let down.

How can it be that if you’ve been lucky enough to find the love of your life (for you must have, to have married each other, right?), you can no longer bear to be in each other’s company? How can you let that love slip away?

Then again, whoever said that the feeling would last forever?

When it comes to love, we’re at the mercy of our biochemistry, say researchers.

One of the best-known experts in this subject is anthropologist Helen Fisher of Rutgers University, the United States.

Love, she says, comes in three flavours and each involves different hormones and chemicals in our bodies.

Stage one is lust, that intense longing driven by the sex hormones testosterone and oestrogen which “get you out looking for anything”.

Stage two is attraction, that wondrous love-struck phase when you feel exhilarated and think obsessively of that one person.

Neurotransmitters called monoamines come into play here. There’s dopamine, which gives you waves of exquisite pleasure even over the smallest thing about your beau.

There’s also norepinephrine, which makes you sweat and your heart beat faster, and serotonin, which has a similar chemical appearance to people suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder.

If a relationship lasts, attachment takes over as the third stage (some experts say the transition from attraction to attachment can take 30 months). It is the bond that keeps couples together, especially when they go on to have children.

Two hormones are released: oxytocin which is released by both sexes during orgasm and helps them bond; and vasopressin, which supports behaviour that leads to long-term commitment.

When disaster strikes

The big problem, though, is that one person can experience the three stages at the same time, with disastrous consequences.

Says Dr Fisher: “You can feel deep attachment for a long-term spouse, while you feel romantic love for someone else, while you feel the sex drive in situations unrelated to either partner.”

The result? Adultery, pain, anger, jealousy and ultimately even divorce.

The thing about love I’ve found is that familiarity does breed contempt or at least boredom, and you’ve really got to work to keep the feeling going.

Little things about your partner that were sweet in the beginning inevitably start to sour once you’ve past the lovesick stage.

Little annoyances can accumulate to make you explode.

But for some, love has a use-by date. Just as friendship between platonic friends can outlive itself, so, too, can long-term romantic love.

I’ve found that love can disappear for a variety of reasons. The cause can be sensational, such as when a partner does something that hurts and deceives you.

More often though, the reasons are prosaic, like over-familiarity, boredom and benign neglect. And with the first-stage lust long gone, the love is quickly spent and you just aren’t into each other anymore.

Still, to have loved and lost must surely be better than to have never loved at all. – The Straits Times Singapore / Asia News Network

Love and lust : Love neglected for lust

"Love, an emotion so strong that you would give up everything. To just feel it once, to know that you are part of something special. To know that you can feel what love really is; to know, to feel, to love." -- Source Unknown

Marriage has been an honorable institution for countless centuries. We have taken it from an arranged marriage to love, then in our times love that is "conditional."

I can almost hear the words changing in the sacred line "Till death do us part" to "Maybe, if you stay young and gorgeous."

Our divorce rates are skyrocketing, and we neglect love for lust.

A bigger controversy lurking in our society still remains. It could tear families apart. We have denied a certain faction of our population the right to have this bond, not just to claim someone on their taxes, but also to have the right to be married lawfully.

This is a repulsive virus spreading through our communities. It is called anti-gay marriage.

I think this topic needs to be addressed over and over again until people realize we are not here to say who can get married and who can't. It is not for us to declare, and I think that if people would just stop reviling gay marriage we could get the bigger and better picture.

Everyone is concerned about different things related to this subject. What would this do to our communities? How would people react? Wouldn't this cause more corruption in society?

Well, the answers are simple. Look to your hearts and comprehend that these two people, whether female or male partners, want the same love classified as your love. They want to know that when they walk down the street holding hands, it is accepted in society. No one wants his or her ways to be shunned!

What about the children of these same-sex parents? Will they turn into being gay as well? Well get your nose out of the air and realize that these children are their own people. They have their own minds and thoughts, and can't be influenced that easily.

With so many broken homes in our country, we should understand that these kids will get better homes.

I don't think their kids will be affected; I personally know this to be true.

Everyone needs to get off of his or her high horse and come back to Earth. We need to accept and love everyone no matter what his or her life is like.

My personal opinion about this is that if we love them, aren't we the better people? This is coming from someone of a conservative background, so I have learned how to not be so judgmental about life situations. I have friends and family members that want this to happen so their love and matrimony will be recognized.

We all need to stop judging, and we need to accept them with vivacity as much as the next change in society will be.

Stephanie Ward is a staff writer for the University Journal. She can be reached at sward@suujournal.com.

Most people have loves of varying types - of Love and Lust

Thinking a lot about love. Like almost any human being, I've had plenty of encounters with love - but I'm not really sure I understand what it is. Love takes many forms. A parent loves a child, a child loves a parent, a sister loves a brother, a man loves his wife or partner, and people love their pets, etc. A person might love chocolate, or gardening, an automobile, a sport, sex, clothes, tools, wine or poetry - or a religion, an intellectual pursuit, a language, or physics.

Most people have loves of varying types - and often love feels like a positive thing, but not always. Love can feel suffocating, hurtful, toxic or destructive to the lover, the beloved, or both. Love contains a complex range of emotional possibilities - it can feel like a cuddly bundle of joy one moment and a howling terror the next. Love can gestate over months or years, or appear suddenly on an unsuspecting person's doorstep… wanted or unwanted. It takes love to provide a blueprint and job experience for a family.

I've known men who said they loved me, and a few whose actions demonstrated affection whether they professed love or not. At times I've believed that I loved a man, only to discover the illusory nature of the experience and the selective or deceptive nature of my perceptions. I suspect that men inflict as much harm on fellow men in the name of love as they do in the name of war, only subtly. Some folks speak of "tough love," and some people speak of a nebulous "love for humanity" as though love constitutes a God-given or universally recognized permission slip to inflict one's desires and demands upon others.

When a man forces his sexual will onto an unwilling partner, we call that rape - or a gang rape, when a group of men participates. Yet when a man or a group of men force their political demands onto unwilling people folks call that good citizenship. A group of men who demand a society free of drugs stop at nothing to achieve it - even when the old and the terminally ill suffer, and they may soon insist on regulating people's vitamin use too. "We'll hurt you and you'd better thank us for it" seems an apt motto for this sort of lusty fanaticism. A drug-free society means a lot of unhappy people forced to endure a lot of pain, or driven to black market dealers - that's brotherly unkindness, not brotherly love.

A group of men determined to free the world of other people's tyrannies will enslave the world for the sake of their own and call that freedom. They're good citizens, and when I exercise self-restraint by not voting, I'm a slacker. At least I'm still free to OD on disgust. If abstinence from casual sex is responsible, how can abstinence from sleazy politics be irresponsible? If I refuse to show up at the voting booth to take my marginal crap-shot at infecting an entire society with politically transmitted social afflictions, I'm irresponsible because I prefer not to inflict high-risk political behavior onto everybody else? Get thee away from my backside, Satan… please keep your dirty political leverage to yourself.

I'm ready to reclaim the word "love" for general usage by reclaiming the word "lust" for general usage as well. What does "tough love" mean, if not unbending lust for assuming positions of political dominance or moral superiority over other people? What does "love for humanity" usually mean, if not condescending lust to nourish one's ego at the expense of a bemused world which might prefer benign tolerance to inadvertent ego-stroking for smugly paternalistic philanthropists of any and all persuasions or orientations?

Lust gets a bad rap as one of the seven deadly sins, and for good reason - yet lust drives the sensible man toward admirable behavior, while love tows the silly man into foolish behavior. If lust can challenge a man to behave well while love can provoke a man to behave badly, does it seem reasonable to consider lust bad and love good? Maybe some deeper meaning got lost in translation… maybe so many tongues stirring the pot spoil the alphabet soup called language that people use to communicate. How can the dead letter kill unless people voluntarily or involuntarily swallow it as a poison? How can the spirit or the Word give life unless people ingest it as an antidote to dead letter poisoning?

I'm tired of seeing lust masquerade as love, giving love a bad name, when lust and love cohabitate along the same spectrum of emotions. Apparently lust - in the "deadly sin" sense - represents a debased form of love that ceases to observe conscientious boundaries and forces itself onto others in unloving, and not necessarily sexual, ways. Conversely, love represents a refined form of lust capable of elevating a mere human being beyond lowlier forms of lust, and above coercive expressions of human desire or affection.

Lust forces itself on unwilling partakers, in other words, while love doesn't - or what's the meaningful difference? It seems wise to preemptively master our own deadly lusts long before they betray us into attacking genuine forms of love that we may not be capable of recognizing because we can't accurately distinguish love from lust. Perhaps that's not our judgment call anyway. The forms of love that busybodies seem most eager to stick their uppity noses into appear to be consensual adult relationships where busybodies are least wanted - and that's obscene.

Technorati : Love and Lust